Wednesday, 22 October 2014

Definition: Compound Sentence

Definition: Compound

Asentencethat contains at least twoindependent
clauses.

Compound sentences can be formed
in three ways:
(1) usingcoordinating
conjunctions(and, but, for, nor, or, so, yet);
(2) using thesemicolon,
either with or without conjunctive adverbs;
(3) on occasion, using thecolon.

The compound sentence is one of
the four basic sentence structures. The other structures are thesimple
sentence, thecomplex
sentence, and thecompound-complex
sentence.

See also:

Examples and
Observations:

·"They may take
our lives, but they will never take our freedom."
(Mel Gibson as William Wallace in Braveheart, 1995)

·"The drought had
lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had
long since ended."
(Arthur C. Clarke,2001: A Space Odyssey, 1968)

·"Feasts must be
solemn and rare, or else they cease to be feasts."
(Aldous Huxley)

·"Arguments are to
be avoided: they are always vulgar and often convincing."
(Oscar Wilde)

·Messages Sent by Compound Sentences
"The structure of acompound sentencesends certain messages to readers, no matter
how you fill in the blanks. First, it tells readers that the sentence contains
two relatively important ideas, each one deserving its own independent clause.
Second, it tells readers that these two ideas are approximately equal in
importance, since they are balanced as a pair. And third, it alerts readers to
the relationship between the two ideas, depending on the connector. For
example,andsuggests
that the two ideas are being added together,butindicates that they are being contrasted, andortells us that they are alternatives. A
semicolon suggests balance between two similar or sharply contrasting
statements."
(Diana Hacker and Betty Renshaw,Writing With a Voice, 2nd ed. Scott, Foresman, 1989)

·"It was dawn
outside, a glowing gray, and birds had plenty to say out in the bare trees; and
at the big window was a face and a windmill of arms."
(David Foster Wallace,Infinite Jest, 1996)

·"The glacier
knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the teacup opens
A lane to the land of the dead."
(W. H. Auden, "As I Walked Out One Evening")

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